Fractured Oblivion
A tale of blood and steel in the age of the Nova Anglian Empire. Chapter 1 - Canytus "It will soon be ours," he spoke, clearly and calmly, "your birthright and my dominion." My husband was always one with a flair for the dramatic, as he stood upon the bridge of our Demithca-class dreadnought. It was a sleek ship that formed to a point far to the prow. I looked upon its beweaponed exterior as my darling continued his righteous tirade. "For Emperor Andromeda grows weak upon his throne and his frail son is half the man he even was," he proclaimed, "soon you shall be the Divine Ruler of the Nova Anglian Empire, backed by the faith for as long as you may reign." There was a cheer from the men stationed with us at the bridge. I assumed that he had assumed a small flock for this display of power. Such formalities were tedious affairs, and while I was a righteous woman, I believe my Lord may have gone too far in his devotion. Still, no other woman in history could lay claim to the fact that they had brought House Polophylax over to the light. Whores and cut-throats. My poor ancestors from our Albion line had suffer their women. Machiavellian witches who only ever aimed to further the honey badger's power. I tried not to laugh at the thought of having their heir as a devout believer. One who genuinely aimed to crown me as their Queen. I guess it was a peculiar position to be in. I had prayed that I would not fall prey to the villainy that my husband's ancestors had been renowned for. That I would not be a victim like my aunt before me. I actually laughed at the thought that my prayers had been answered. "My Queen," my husband spoke, "why are you overcome by mirth?" "I am but laughing at the very idea that the Nova Anglian Empire could oppose us," I replied, "My Lord." "Oh yes, of course, the crumbling wreck it is," he chortled back, "even more damn incompetent than those Dominish bastards." "You mean the very same you were all set to join before my father wed you to me?" I teased. "Before I saw the light of the stars and realised their true destiny," he righteously proclaimed, "brought to me by an Imperial Angel of your very own name, dearest Canytus." I blushed slightly, it was so endearing to see him possessed by such righteous fury. I did not genuinely doubt the strength of the Nova Anglian Empire, although I was aware of its many fractures. And most importantly, the ruin that Ioris Space had fallen into after the wars with the Dominion. My brave little honey badgers had fought tooth and claw to secure it for my father, while he wasted away his power at the behest of a foolish Empire. I may have been once been Catherine Phoebe Elizabeth of Andromeda Ioris, but I was a Polophylax Polophylax through and through now. The Andromedas were pompous bureaucrats unfit to govern rats, while my husband was a warrior forged in the heat of battle. A natural born leader that only needed to turn his attentions from whoring to the truth of the light of God in order become a true king of men. Guiding his hand, I could take what was rightfully mine and prevent it from falling to my oafish brother. The damned Prince Eustace Marcus Olantis of Andromeda Ioris, Heir Apparent to Ioris Space. I'd rather sooner see his head on a plate than his rear quarters upon any seat of power. I had been the first born daughter of the Ioris dynasty. I was by right entitled to be my father's heir. All my father could seem to spawn was more daughters. When I turned nine, after the birth of my fifth sister, he finally recognised me as the Crown Princess. I was schooled in the ways of war and educated to rule with the authority of a king. This continued until my seventeenth name-day. Out of devotion to my dearest father I had remained fair and chaste, so that I could remain unspoiled for the prince who would become my king. Alas, my bitch of a mother fell pregnant with a male child. My world was shattered as I lost my claim to the throne. All I had left was faith to turn to. I prayed for both my mother's and my brother's death. I wanted divine retribution upon the family that had betrayed me. I locked myself in the chapel for several months, surviving off of the food my loyal ladies-in-waiting brought me. I even plotted to kill my father and my brother so that I could take the throne by force. But alas, I was just a stupid girl who lacked the means to do so. Then one day, my father did come to visit me. A rather sickening smile upon his pasty white face. It fractured his beard in a manner that made me worry about what his next action would be. At which point he did speak and tell me that I was to be wed to the Lord of House Polophylax. The reason given was a simple one. He needed the House to remain loyal to the Empire. That was all I had been stripped down to. A bargaining chip who could be sent off to the lowest bidder. I begged my father to reconsider. To send one of my younger sisters in my place. All he did was laugh at the suggestions. 'The Lord of the Saeletan Sector will require a flowered woman to bring him sons, not a stupid little girl,' he did say to me. I remember feeling like a sword had been driven through my heart. My father had betrayed further than I could ever have imagined. My mother was the wife of a King, at the very least I had hoped for the same. I could have been bequeathed to my sweet cousin, Michael. I could have been a consort to the Emperor, but my father had robbed me of that claim. Even Prince Calvin would have been a desirable match. A Queen for one of the other Andromedas is the position I should have had. It was what happened to most highborn women of our house. Yet here, I had been given to one of the lowest of all Imperial Houses. I had heard the stories, of the iniquitous ways of the Polophylaxes. Their dark desires and traitorous hearts. How they had slain every other family sworn to their name in order to keep ownership of the Saeletan Sector firmly within the grasp of the ancient Polophylax Dynasty. It is said that they had once been kings who refused to bend the knee. Men capable of standing up to even the Emperor himself. What brought them low, one might wonder? The guile of a woman. Everyone of a noble education knew of the treachery of Katirys Polophylax Serpentarius and how absorption of House Polophylax into the Nova Anglian Empire was founded upon betrayal. How then, could I, one of the highest born of women be sold away to a man of such a savage family. The fear that overcame me lead me to madness. I had nightmares of this Polophylaxan Lord molesting me in my sleep. Torturing me to sate his brutal lusts. House Polophylax were savage warriors with not a grain of respect located anywhere upon their being. My life was now forfeit to their Lord. On the night before the wedding I decided if I could not be given my rightful claim as a Princess of House Andromeda, I would end my own life to spite my father. To have House Polophylax reject him as their king, within his own throne room, would be the sweetest vengeance I could give to him. For they would have seen my death as a trick to lure them to Sagittarius. With any luck, the Polophylaxes would have left their realm to the Dominion that day. Yet, fate had other plans. As I slit my wrists, a man heard my moans of agony and burst into my room. I remember him clearly that day. A lithe man with wild hair and an untamed beard. As I struggled to finish my suicidal actions, he restrained me in order to treat my wounds. While he did so, the man told me that had been assigned to guard my door the entire night before my wedding, by order of King Ioris. That he was to protect the King's daughter from any harm that was to befall her. I started to hate that man. He had now robbed me of my only means of vengeance. I wanted to stab him or have him executed. Instead, all I could do was cry. He bound my left wrist and held me in a manner to which I was unfamiliar. That was when I learned his name. Lord Mercantys Polophylax, First of His Name. He explained how he believed he was being punished by the King for the act of kinslaying. That the fact he was to perform the role of a guard and have his right to a Lord's chambers stripped from him, was King Ioris' way of illustrating his disgust at the fact the previous lord had been slain by his own blood. I remember as he then lamented about the crime. That the only reason he had committed it was to prevent House Polophylax from betraying the Empire and swearing fealty to the Dominion. I am not sure, even now, if he had been lying that day. All I know is that he confessed that he had only maintained the ruse of siding with the Dominion so that for once House Andromeda might take notice of his ailing Sector's plight. The man I saw now was far greater than the broken shadow I had comforted that day. Mercantys had risen tremendously with me by his side. The determination I saw within him to give me the Ioris Crown and fulfill my desires. His loyalty was far more passionate than I could have hoped for and the ambition I nurtured in him had grown fantastically. To him, bearing the title of Emperor did not seem too far fetched these days. Myself? Originally I would have been content with my birthright secured. I would have been content knowing that the future of my daughter, my rightful heir, was to be Queen of Ioris Space. But, I must confess, the temptations of the Empire were incredibly alluring. Once I seize Ioris and slay my brother, Sagittarius will be well and truly within my sights. I was jarred back to reality as our warship's waygate engines cooled and I felt the ancient starship drift into fringe space. Here, the Empire met the wilds of the Dominion. It was the edge of civilization, in the eyes of the Nova Anglian Empire. To House Polophylax it was their space to reeve and pillage. It had been centuries since these worlds had last fallen prey to the honey badger's claws. Long enough that the atrocities the Saeletans had committed would no longer be in living memory. However, this was a mission of conquest. For the system had recently fallen into the hands of House Dantus. Here would be the perfect location to demonstrate the true might of the Dominion of Saeletia and the ancient horrors they still possessed. "Send word to Governor Dantus of our arrival," I commanded, "tell him I expect full royal honours!" "Yes, Your Grace," the young Lieutenant curtsied before leaving her station upon the command deck. "L'Orlan once stood proudly against us!" I proclaimed with righteous fury, "They were honorable foes deserving of Saeletia's mercy! Yet now they stand broken by the blade of tyrants. We shall grace them with our presence once more. This space is ours by right, not Albion's! It's time to remind him of our claim!" "For the Claw!" my husband bellowed, "and the glory of the Rock Forged King!" "For the Claw!" I shoved my right hand upwards with my fingers curled into a curved shape as I echoed what my husband had shouted. I smiled as my subjects quickly followed suit. I imagined that the rest of the crew would have proclaimed it for my voice permeated the sound systems of the mighty warship. I gazed upon the ships long range scanners and saw the outline of the planet against the blaze of the L'Orlan sun. * As I set foot upon solid rock it was a largely surreal experience. A rare moment when I was resplendent in my full finery as was befitting of a Nova Anglian Princess. Today I had to don the guise of Catherine Andromeda Ioris once more all for the sake of the chauvinistic traditions of a tyrannical empire. I imagined there would have been comments about how it was one of those rare moments where I embraced my feminine side and was not outfitted for war. Nothing could be further from the truth. When I was the First Princes of Ioris, I was always at my most dangerous. I had absolutely no intentions to negotiate with a gun in my pocket. It would be firmly clasped within my hands. "Announcing Her Royal Highness Princess Catherine Pheobe Elizabeth Andromeda Ioris of Polophylax Polophylax, Lady of Saeletia, Handmaiden of the Emperor's Justice, Bringer of the Free Light and Blessed Herald of the Nova Anglian Empire," was the proclamation given by my Lieutenant General. I walked down a small concourse that had been constructed as the means of exiting from my royal shuttle. I smiled as I embraced the fresh L'Orlan air. I reminded me of my home of Sagittarius. It seemed so far removed from the harshness of Demithca. My smile broadened as I looked up to see my archaic flag ship hanging menacingly in the L'Orlan sky. I truly hoped that it's vicious shape would have evoked some primal fear in the local populace as well as the Imperial delegates who had settled it. Perhaps it would even be recognised for the primeval horror it was. However, this was doubtful as millennia had passed since these warships had last left the sanctuary of the Saeletan Space to bring carnage upon the enemies of the Badger. Only one had been successfully salvaged from the abandoned shipworks of Demithca Minor and it had been almost two decades since I had first looked upon the ailing frame of the gargantuan beast. To see it now, in all its glory was simply breathtaking in a manner that was almost macabre. For to look upon the dreadnought was to look upon God's fury in its purest form. I was soon to be his holy instrument as the destroyer of worlds. Chapter 2 - Calvin Chapter 3 - Hannah Chapter 4 - Eustace Chapter 5 - Canytus Chapter 6 - Sasha Category:Stories